Critical Essay by Mary R. Bowman

In the following essay, Bowman discusses Spenser's treatment of Queen Elizabeth I in Book V of The Faerie Queene.

“The woman who has the prerogative of a goddess, who is authorized to be out of place, can best justify her authority by putting other women in their places”: so concludes Louis Montrose with equal reference to Raleigh's vision of Elizabeth in the Discovery of Guiana and Spenser's reflection of her in Britomart in the Radigund episode in the fifth book of The Faerie Queene.1 In the case of Spenser at least that conclusion is an insightful one, suggesting that Britomart's actions can in part be explained in terms of the...